Christina Rainie had been trying to reach her friend for three days. For some reason, he wasn’t responding to wireless text messages, online instant messages or cellphone calls.
When the pair of University of Georgia freshmen finally did make contact on the fourth day, they argued – heated cellphone exchanges interspersed with apologetic text messages.
A frustrated Rainie decided she no longer wanted him to be her date for the upcoming sorority dance.
“Three days? It’s like eternity!” she explained.
For a generation accustomed to near-instantaneous keeping in touch – primarily via instant messaging, cellphones and e-mail – Rainie’s complaint doesn’t seem so far-fetched, especially since she and her generational peers are perfectly comfortable roaming in a social sphere where real face-to-face encounters take a back seat to cyber contact.
Yet it’s unclear whether the relative ease of digital communication boosts or harms developing young adults.
“Sometimes I long for the days when kids went outside and played and were not so wired,” said Sid Royer, a Seattle lawyer with an 18-year-old daughter and a son, 21. “To some extent, it affects their creativity and their attention span, and there’s a desire to have everything immediately.”
Then again, “were it not for cellphones and e-mails, I’d have much less contact with both my children” who both are away at school.
For better or worse, the new era is here.
Young couples profess puppy love for each other in their instant-messaging profiles. For teens, blogs and other Internet journals – which are public or semipublic – have become confessionals that can take gossip to a whole new level, fanning the flames of campus rumors and scandals.
Others are creating study groups and “poking” each other – essentially saying, “hey” – via a popular new online network called thefacebook now found at 200 colleges and universities.
“Digital devices are the social lubricant now,” said Derek White, an executive vice president at Alloy Inc., a youth marketing and research firm.
While their time spent in front of the computer and online has grown, teens are now spending less time on other social activities. In a 2004 survey of youths aged 13-18, White said the number of teens going to the mall and out on dates dropped by 5 percent, compared to 1997. Those going to dances decreased by 10 percent.
Contrary to some perceptions, youths spend most of their time online communicating with people they know, not strangers, said Elisheva Gross, a psychology researcher at the University of California at Los Angeles.
Far from digging a social black hole, they are using high-tech means to maintain or expand their network of relationships. “It’s used to hang out with friends, relieve boredom or flirt,” Gross said.
Initial observations are that, more than shaping one’s personality, the use of online communication extends existing habits and traits.
“If they happen to not be physically active already in life, then I think the Internet just pushes them in the direction of not doing anything,” said Kaveri Subrahmanyam, an associate professor at California State University. “But if they’re already active, the Internet doesn’t pull them away, it just bolsters their activity.”
For instance, 15-year-old Gabby McCone of Seattle, spends hours online daily instant messaging her friends, but she is also on her school basketball team and plays guitar.
Rana Hanocka, a high school freshman in Norwalk, Conn., admits she was considered a dork until she started reaching out to others more via instant messaging. Her voice and confidence emboldened, she now hangs with a more popular crowd at school.
Her conversations that start on campus almost always continue online as soon as she gets home from school and parks herself in front of the computer, usually for about four hours a day. During the past summer, she hardly used the phone at all and instead kept up with dozens of her buddies in cyberspace.
It’s not just with friends.
For Rana’s mother, Kayla Hanocka, as with many other parents, there’s no more leaving notes on refrigerators.
“I just e-mail her,” Kayla Hanocka said, “or text message her instead.”
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